


Arctic Ice

by MurasakiNoAo



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Non-Magical, Alternate Universe - Zombie Apocalypse, Angst, Gen, M/M, Minor Character Death, Unhappy Ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-10
Updated: 2015-02-10
Packaged: 2018-03-11 10:57:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3324956
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MurasakiNoAo/pseuds/MurasakiNoAo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The world is ending. Well, at least for them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Arctic Ice

**Author's Note:**

> Half inspired by this quote:
> 
> “Earth has survived everything in its time. It will certainly survive us. If all the nuclear weapons in the world went off at once and all the plants, all the animals died and the earth was sizzling hot for a hundred thousand years, life would survive, somewhere: under the soil, frozen in Arctic ice.” ~ Michael Crichton, Jurassic Park

“Where are we going?” Albus asks in a hushed voice because they aren’t that far from camp. His hand is hurting from being pulled so harshly in Gellert’s way of telling him to hurry and he is anxious to be apart from his siblings for so long, especially after their parent’s death a little over a year ago.

“You’ll see,” Gellert whispers back with his usual mischievous smirk on his face. He picks up the pace and jumps over a small uprooted tree, pausing to make sure Albus makes it over as well.

He should be used to this. In the last month that they had known each other Gellert has dragged him off into different part of the woods for conversations best left to only be heard by themselves. They talked of running off in the dead of night, of taking Albus’ siblings and making a break for freedom outside of the small colony of survivors.

Though he doesn’t talk about it much, before he had stumbled across the colony Gellert had been on his own in a world that was falling apart. No one is sure how he lived when the dead are walking everywhere in the cities and you can become infected by eating just an ounce of a tainted source. It was pure luck when a patrol found him and brought him back to camp, causing the surprise reunion between him and his great-aunt Bathilda Bagshot.

If anyone was going to survive outside of camp, Gellert would certainly be the one to do it.

This fact comforts Albus, but sometimes doubt would flicker into his mind. Sure, Gellert could survive on his own, but with three others who had never been beyond the tree line since this whole mess began? They’re only teenagers and there’s much more than the Undead to be afraid of out there. Perhaps tomorrow he could at least relay this information to Aberforth and Ariana…

As if sensing his thoughts, Gellert stops to look at his companion, blue eyes matching blue eyes. They stare long at each other and Albus feels his heart beat faster when he sees the trust and determination blazing in the other’s gaze. It squelches his doubts and replaces them with butterflies.

Albus nods for them to continue and the returning smile he receives makes the world a more colorful place.

 

* * *

 

Another month passes without much progress. Aberforth and Ariana are still in the dark about this and Gellert has expressed his want to not tell them until all preparations have been made. Even though he has sound reasoning, Albus is still unsure about it.

“They’ll find out eventually. Aberforth is already becoming suspicious of me and it would be better if they heard it from us directly.” He says during one of their sneak-away nights in attempt to let his friend know how much this bothers him.

“And if they don’t want to come? If they tell others about our plans? We won’t be ready by then. If we wait until we are ready, then we can just make a run for it by ourselves.” Gellert replies gently, for he does know. “Please try to understand, Albus.”

He does try. And he succeeds for the most part, until that one night when everything changes.

 

* * *

 

It’s just another dark evening. The night patrol has just been sent out and now Gellert is shaking Albus awake, who has been particularly exhausted due to the lack of sleep he’s been getting from all these nightly excursions. He is really out of it tonight and Gellert is forced to be louder than usual, using shouting whispers in his friend’s ear to undue sleep’s spell.

Once it registers that he is meant to wake, Albus shoots up in a flash of panic, panting as if he had just run a mile. Upon seeing this, Gellert soothes him quietly, carefully and yet quickly moving him up and towards the woods once more; there’s no telling who had heard his attempts of waking the other. Tonight would be special, for there is big news he has planned on telling Albus that he’s excited for. News that can change everything.

So their journey this time around is short, Gellert leading them to a small clearing only five minutes away rather than the usual ten. Moonlight filters in from the trees above as Albus catches his breath, watching Gellert stand in the middle of the glade under the strongest beam of light. He thinks about how remarkable his best friend really is.

For a while now Albus has been feeling… different around Gellert. Each touch has become more distinct than the last, as if the added times they’ve come into contact causes his skin to tingle more and the hair on his arms to raise in- ah what is the word? Excitement? _Craving?_ He isn’t quite sure, but he likes it.

He likes it a lot.

“We’re leaving tomorrow night.” Gellert speaks after a few minutes, snapping Albus back into reality with the intensity of his words.

“B-but Aberforth and Ariana-” he sputters once the initial shock resides, though is cut off unexpectedly.

“-will know by the time we leave. They’ll either join us or not, the choice is theirs.” He watches Albus slowly turn pale as a sheet. Sighing softly, he leans down and takes the other’s hands in his own for calm reassurance. “Listen to me, everything is going to work out. I’ll teach you all that I know. We’ll stay strong. We’ll stay _together_. Do you understand? Albus?”

A lone tear manages to slide out, though he nods nonetheless. Only a moment ago he had felt a crushing amount of apprehension and fear of the unknown, of the possibility of being forced to abandon his siblings should they chose to stay and rot in the forest. Now that elephant on his chest has been lifted and replaced with blooming warmth and slight foolishness. What did it matter, any of that, as long as Gellert is here with him?

Filled with determination, Albus allows himself to be pulled up by his companion and opens his mouth to say-

“I believe that’s a pretty inauspicious plan you’ve got there.” The sudden voice startles both teenagers, causing them to whip around and take a few steps backwards to see who has caught them.

From the bushes emerges none other than Aberforth with Ariana following quietly in tow behind him. The former glares at his eldest brother with disbelief and betrayal, which forces the other to look away as Gellert steps forward. “And why is it an inauspicious plan?”

“How were you planning to take care of all of us, Albus?” Aberforth snaps, completely ignoring Gellert, much to his chagrin. “Especially Ariana. You know that she frightens easily. What would you do if she has a panic attack? If we encounter a clever Undead?”

“We have weapons.” Gellert inputs, taking another step forward. “And food. Do you think we would not be prepared?” he blows out air through his nostrils in a sarcastic manner. “As for your sister, I can easily defend her. You’re forgetting that I’ve spent most of this hell out there and not cooped up in a tiny camp like some _chicken_.”

“We can’t trust him, Albus. How do you know he won’t betray us? Betray _you_ when things get tough? We’re safe here-”

The next few moments happen in a swift blur. Albus is aware of the radiating anger and frustration growing in Gellert, the quick flash of sharp silver glinting in the light, and suddenly he himself is standing in front of Aberforth, the knife he pickpocketed from the storage a few days ago out and in contact with Gellert’s own. He is emotionless, acting purely on instinct. Not even the shock from his best friend, the one he was beginning to - or perhaps still - love , draws out a reaction.

Albus pushes back on the knife and sends Gellert stumbling back into the middle of the clearing, his weapon now only held loosely in his hand. “A-Albus?”

But he doesn’t back down. Approaching slowly, he lifts his arms in a fighting stance. “I will not stand by and watch you hurt my family, Gellert.” There’s a quick break that the still silence fills before he continues quietly, “They are all I have left.”

In the exact moment those words slip off his tongue, as if in a sick form of irony, a piercing scream fills the air and turns his blood to ice. Pivoting around, Albus is met with a sight that is engraved to the backs of his eyelids.

Ariana is laying on the ground, mouth open, eyes so wide they seem to be popping out of her skull, while a shadowed figure above her sinks its teeth into the flesh of her neck. Its head jerks up and a flow of blood spurts into the crisp night air and Albus finds himself looking into the bleary eyes of an Undead.

With a scream or two of his own, Aberforth springs away from the atrocity in fright. “Kill it!” He screeches at either of the two with the weapons. “Throw the knife! Kill it now!”

But he can’t move. Frozen to the ground with a distant gaze, Albus feels as though he is simply watching the television - watching a horror show that just happened to be on. The blood on that Undead can’t be his sister’s. The body on the ground that is not moving save for the occasional twitch just can’t be Ariana. Those eyes that were once bright and happy should not be cold and glazed with unshed tears and veiled with death.

Somehow he forces himself to look away, only to find Gellert a few paces to his right. The boy, the one who had instilled so much courage and faith into Albus, now stands in horror and fear of the thing he promised he could prevent. The thing he promised to stop. And yet now, after only watching for a few moments, he turns and runs. He leaves behind Ariana, Aberforth, the knife he had dropped in surprise, and the food supplies they had gathered in a nearby tree knot hole.

He leaves behind Albus and doesn’t looks back.

What seems like an hour (though in reality only a few seconds) later, the sound of a thud draws Albus’ attention back to the Undead. It is now motionless above Ariana, an unfamiliar knife dug deep into the back of its head. Once it falls, bodies move in from the bushes to surround them. _The night patrol_ , Albus thinks in numb relief.

One of the newcomers tenderly gathers Aberforth and Albus, and while the former struggles to stay by his sister’s side, demanding to know if she will be all right, the latter follows in a detached sort of trance. The forest blurs in his vision until he comes back into focus at the camp.

People have emerged from their tents, and somewhere Albus hears Bathilda Bagshot worrying over the whereabouts of her great-nephew. Soft murmurs echo throughout the colony, but it would take no detective to figure out just what they are whispering about. The amount of noise they must’ve been making should be the biggest clue.

Albus then unexpectedly tears himself away from the patroller, ignoring the calls for him to wait, and disappears from public view into his own tent. The one he shares with his siblings- no. The one he shares with his _sibling_ , if Aberforth will even allow them to continue as such.

It’s at this moment that what had happened really begins to set in. Colors mix, the world tips, and the last thing he remembers is puking all over his sleeping bag.

 

* * *

 

When he reawakens, it’s light out and he is wrapped in a blanket that he doesn’t recall belonging to him. Upon shifting to get a better view of the tent he is in, he realizes that his shirt is also missing.

“You’re awake.” It’s not a question Aberforth suddenly voices, but Albus feels the need to reply in the only way he can think of at the moment.

“Yes, I’m awake…”

He wants to ask so many questions. _What happened to Ariana? To that undead? Are we going to be punished? Where is my shirt? Do you blame me for what happened?_

_Where’s Gellert?_

But his throat closes up and he decides that it’s perhaps better not to ask anything at all. It take a few more minutes for the silence to end and when it does Albus wishes it had remained unbroken.

“What was he to you? He obviously had to have been someone important for you to go behind your own family’s backs.” Aberforth mutters, carefully watching his brother’s reaction to such an inquiry. The older teen curses his observant eyes. “I deserve at least this answer, brother.”

“I don’t know,” Albus eventually chokes out because for whatever reason he finds this the hardest thing to speak about. “We never talked about it.” But oh God, did he wish they had at least once.

Aberforth huffs in false amusement and turns away. He speaks little to the elder Dumbledore after this exchange. Even when Albus is cleared by the medical tent to roam around camp he gives the other a stinging cold shoulder despite pleading attempts.

After a bit Albus just stops trying, succumbing to the iced layer of solitude now shielding him from the pain as night after night he lays awake, waiting for the familiar voice to call him into the woods for the last time.


End file.
